Story of My Life
by Princess of Ithilien
Summary: I've belonged to the state almost my entire life. I've been bounced around in different foster homes, and I've ended up running away from them all. And now, since the State can't find me another home, I'm going to a BOYS juvenile delinquent camp? R
1. Prologue

A/N: Yeah yeah yeah, it's another 'Girl goes to Camp Greenlake' fic. Even I get sick of them. And now I'm writing one. Twisted, right? Anyway, muse bit me.

**I know, it's been done a lot. I'm working on making this one different. Unique. Trying to make it a really good story, and I think that I've done a good job so far.(I've already typed up some rough drafts of future chapters.)**

Disclaimer: If I was Louis Sachar, that would be awesome, because it would mean that I wrote Holes, but alas, I'm not him. I don't even LOOK like him. Do I LOOK like some old guy? Wait...don't answer that...too many people would insult me by saying yes.

**Prologue**

I'm not a bad kid. Honest. Okay, so I've caused a heck of a lot of trouble to all my foster parents, and maybe gotten involved in a few fistfights in school. Add some minor theft on top of that. And I've run away. A lot. But I don't think that those minor things can possible make me deserve to go to some juvenile delinquent camp. Since I've belonged to the state my whole life, I've not exactly had it easy. Being bounced around a ton of foster homes, like some old sweater that nobody wants. And what kid wouldn't cause trouble after 14 years of being treated like crap? Sure, some of the people were nice. But you could tell, nobody _wanted _me. Most of them were either big families with lots of screaming babies or newlyweds who wanted to see what having a kid would be like. I probably wasn't the best example for those people. Point is, nobody wanted me. My own _mother _didn't want me, for crying out loud. She dumped me on some pastor's doorstep when I was a baby and took off.

So I grew up, distant from everybody, basically just hiding in my own little shell. And I got hardened. Pretty soon I was almost to a point where I didn't feel anything. One time after school I saw this kid getting beat up, and I just shrugged it off. Stuff like that happens. I spent a lot of time on the street, too, when I ran away, before they found me and hauled me off again. Living on the street hardens a person faster than anything. I caused trouble myself. I _did _pick fights with kids at school. I disrespected authority figures. And now where am I? Stuck on a hot, dirty bus, in _handcuffs,_ driving through a desert to a _boys _juvenile delinquent camp. And why am I going there? Because the State can't find a place for me. No one wants me. They couldn't find _anybody_ who wanted to take me in. No one wants me. But I don't care.


	2. What the HECK is going on here?

A/N: Finally typing this up.

Disclaimer: Holes is not mine. Duh. Do you think Louis Sachar writes fanfiction? Nooooooo.

**Chapter 1: What the HECK is going on here?**

You know, I've been in some pretty bad places. Lots of those foster homes were really crappy places with all sorts of infestations. And lots of those places either didn't give me food most of the time, or gave me the scraps. And lots of those places had leaky roofs, broken windows, doors that didn't close and no running water. But whatever I was expecting of Camp Green Lake, I sure wasn't expecting it to be such a DUMP.

And maybe I was expecting a lake. Okay, so if I'd have thought about it, I probably would've realized that the chances of a lake surviving out in the middle of a desert were about nil. But I wasn't thinking about it. And maybe I was expecting some nice wooden cabins or something. But what I found was some dingy buildings, and tents. Tents. Those big, military-looking ones. I saw some boys in orange jumpsuits milling around the buildings and the tents, and some of them were taking showers. _That's _when I started panicking. There was absolutely no way on earth that I was taking a shower in a stall where the wall only came to the boys' waists.

I must've stared for a while, because pretty soon the guard who had ridden over with me was tapping me on my shoulder and motioning for me to follow him. I followed, shifting my backpack to my other shoulder. The guard led me into one of the dingy buildings, and I was glad to find it was air-conditioned. My gaze roved around the room for a while before resting on the man at the desk. He was talking with the guard, but he was looking straight at me, occasionally spitting sunflower seed shells into a jar. He seemed stern. A little bit scary and intimidating too. But I've been around a lot of people like that. I'm just used to them.

"You want her to stay here?" He asked, spitting another shell. "She has to stay here," the guard replied, digging a paper out of the folder he had been carrying. "Court order."

The man with the sunflower seeds didn't glance at the paper. "We don't have any vacancies. There isn't room for her." Great. So nobody had told them I was coming.

"You'd better _make_ room for her." the guard growled. "I'm getting paid extra for taking her out here, and I am not taking her back."

This time the man at the desk looked at the paper, then held out his hand for the file the guard was holding.

"They know that this is a boys camp?"

"Yeah."

"How long am I supposed to keep her?"

"Until the judge says he's found her another place, I guess." The guard replied. The man at the desk nodded. "She supposed to dig?" He asked. The guard shrugged. "Guess so." What the heck? Dig? As in holes? Maybe that explained all those holes scattered across the desert that had started appearing as we got closer to camp.

"I am Mr. Sir," the man with the seeds said as he perused over my file. "Aurora Jacobson.That right?"

"Yes, sir. People call me Rory, though." I replied. The words came out raspy. My mouth felt cottony and dry.

"Wait here." Mr. Sir got up from his seat and walked out of the room. The guard followed him. I walked around a little, stretching my legs after my long ride.

Soon I heard footsteps outside and turned. I could see Mr. Sir and the guard standing outside, talking. Mr. Sir signed a paper, which the guard took, then Mr. Sir came back into the room as the guard walked back to the bus.

He stared at me a moment, then motioned me to follow him. Within a minute we were in another dimly lit room, and Mr. Sir retrieved something from a shelf. He handed an orange jumpsuit, t-shirt, and an orange cap to me and motioned to a closet. "You can change in there." I must've been staring at them like, I have to wear _these? _because Mr. Sir looked a little less stern and shrugged. "Everybody has to wear them. I'll find you some boots."

I went into the closet and changed into the scratchy, ill-fitting jumpsuit, then stuffed my jeans and t-shirt into my backpack. I went back out and found Mr. Sir waiting, a pair of boots in hand. While I tied the laces, he explained how the camp was run. "Holes need to be five feet deep and five feet across in every direction. We're working on setting up your own shower, since you can't use the same ones as the boys." _Thank God._ "We're putting another cot in D tent. That's where you'll be staying." Great. I was going to be stuck in a tent full of boys. Things just do _not _swing my way. It's just like I'm up to bat, and I swing a strike every time.

Soon another man entered the room. I had this sudden impulse to scream and run away. He was wearing shorts, knee socks, and this straw hat. He looked insane, especially with his big black beard and huge ears. He was almost shorter than me, and I'm pretty short as it is. "Welcome to Camp Green Lake, Rory!" Oh, gag. He was a cheerful person. I hate cheerful people. "I'm Dr. Pendanski, the D tent counselor. Things are going to be a little tight in D tent, but I'm sure you'll have a good time during your stay here." Sure. Digging holes is going to be great fun. At least it'll be something to do.

"Follow me, I'll take you to the tent." I grabbed my backpack off the ground and slung it over my shoulder. The minute we got outside, everything seemed to go quiet. It was like one of those times where you are in this crowded place and everyone is talking, and then suddenly _no one _is talking. And no one was talking because they were all staring. At me. Straight at me. Then it dawned on me that these guys probably hadn't seen in a girl in a long time. All those nervous feelings I had had before about coming to a boy's camp came back full-force. Then it _really _hit me: I was going to be sleeping in a tent full of guys. Full of juvenile delinquents. Full of _criminals._ And normally, that wouldn't freak me out, because I used to hang out with people like that at school. But usually I was only around those people for a couple of hours. I was going to be _living _with these people.

So I followed Dr. Pendanski, who was chattering away about something, looking around self-consciously. As we passed the showers, I noticed some men rigging up a curtain around one of the stalls.

Pretty soon we were inside the tent, making our way over to a cot that had been jammed into a corner. A crate was squeezed between it and the cot right beside it, and I caught a glimpse of soap, a canteen and some clean sheets. "You can put your stuff there." I tossed my backpack in. "Now, come on out and meet some of the boys!" I cringed, but followed him back out of the tent. On the way out, I noticed a small black boy laying on his cot, his back to me.

I was glad of the cap, as it shielded my eyes from the sun, and partially from the stares. Things seemed to have gone almost normal again. Lots of the boys were in groups talking. Dr. Pendanski motioned a few boys over.

"Boys, this is Rory, and she'll be staying in your tent for a while, until the state can find her another place." He said this so cheerily it could've been disguised as good news. "Rory, this is Stanley, Alan, Theodore and Rex." They all looked at me uncertainly, except for the last one, Rex, the one who wore thick glasses. "Those ain't our names, Mom. That's Caveman, Squid, Armpit, and I'm X-Ray." He pointed to each of the boys in turn. I was still trying to figure out why he was calling Dr. Pendanski 'Mom'.

"Rory, they do all have their nicknames, but I hope you will choose to call them by their real names as I have." I gave Dr. 'Mom' Pendanski a long look, then turned my gaze to the boots on my feet. When I looked back up, a tall, blonde boy with a long neck had joined us, as well as a shorter, Hispanic-looking guy. "This is Ricky," Dr Pendanski said, motioning to the tall one, "and Jose."

"Wrong, man. Zigzag and Magnet." X-Ray replied with a smug look.

I just stood there, silent, looking at all of them, Dr. Pendanski, and the ground in turn, trying to figure out what kind of place this was going to be to live in. Instinct told me it wasn't going to be pretty.


	3. Oh, goody Slop

Disclaimer: Rory is my character, I own nothing else.

**Chapter 2: Oh, goody. Slop.**

I've eaten some pretty disgusting stuff. One foster home only gave me expired cans of tuna to eat for weeks on end. And you might think, well, expired tuna can't be THAT bad. But when it's months and months past the expiration date, it is NASTY. What's worse, I hate tuna. But after eating dinner at Camp Green Lake, I would've given just about anything for a can of expired tuna.

After I met the boys I went back into the tent. Dr. Pendanski followed me in, carrying a dark blue curtain. "To partition your cot off from the rest of them," he explained as he and another counselor rigged it up around my part of the room. "The boys change in here, you know." I just nodded and lay down on my cot after putting the sheets on. The mattress was lumpy and it smelled _bad. _The sheets were clean, but the mattress itself smelled like bad milk or something. I just lay there, my hands folded across my stomach, staring at the top of the tent. I must've fallen asleep, because after a while I heard someone's voice calling my name.

I got up and pulled back the curtain. Stanley/Caveman was standing at the entrance to the tent. "It's time for dinner." I failed to bring a fake smile to my face and followed him out. We walked in silence, and I was glad he didn't try to make me talk. I rarely talk to people. You just can't trust people, and I sure didn't want to entrust any of these strangers with all the mucky details of my past. I thought about how ironic that was. They were here for a reason too. They probably had unpleasant pasts too.

Stanley/Caveman led me through the line to get dinner and down to a table where the other D tent boys were sitting. He sat down and I squeezed onto the bench next to him. I looked down at my tray. It was literal slop. It was this real disgusting brown color, chunky, and I swore I saw _green _things poking out of it. I picked at it and moved it around my plate a little, then decided to try a bite. I was _starving. _The only thing I'd had to eat all day was a really mushy peanut butter sandwich that the guard gave me on the bus. The slop was warm and mushy, and when I chewed it seemed to spread all over my mouth. And I can't even begin to describe the taste. It was like cheeseburger casserole meets asparagus or something really odd like that. I quickly took a bite of bread, grateful that at least _some_thing was edible.

The boys were pretty quiet, occasionally trading comments with each other. But I knew why it was such an awkward silence. Me. And I was wondering why they weren't asking me about my past, since it seems that almost every person I've ever met, from teachers to neighbors, has wanted to know, when Rex/X-Ray looks at me and asks the dreaded question. "What are you here for?"

No good acting like I didn't hear him. It had been completely quiet until the question. I shrugged and looked down at my tray.

Apparently that wasn't a good enough answer for Rex/X-Ray. "Oh, c'mon," he said. "There has to be a reason. We all know why we're here. Caveman stole a pair of shoes. Magnet tried to steal a puppy." If he thought that giving examples of what the other boys had done was going to make me talk, he was W-R-O-N-G.

"Man, she's just like Zero," I heard one of the boys say.

"Yeah, 'cept Caveman finally got Zero to talk." Another replied.

"Hey, Caveman, get her to talk." This one came from Rex/X-Ray, and it sounded more like an order than a request. I asked myself why I was being so stubborn, when they were probably going to find out eventually anyway. But I wasn't used to just giving out my entire history to strangers.

"Mom said something about the state findin' her another home," That was Alan/Squid.

I was getting really annoyed. _Just tell them, Rory, they'll probably get it out of you eventually anyway, _a little voice in my head told me. I told it to shut up.

"I know! The aliens zapped her down here to spy on us!" I had to look up at that one. Everybody was staring at Ricky/Zigzag, who was looking back at all of them with this crazed look in his eyes. "She's probably not even _human._" Some of the boys chuckled.

Okay, so Ricky/Zigzag was a little out there. Check that, he was way out there.

"What'd Mom say your name was? Rory?" Again, from Rex/X-Ray. I guessed that he was the 'boss' of the tent, since he did sit at the head of the table and he was the one bugging me with all the questions.

"Yeah," I replied.

The table went quiet.

"So she does talk."

I'm not sure who said that, but I was getting really annoyed by all their comments. They were all staring at me. I just stared back.

"So, what'd you do to land you here?" Rex/X-Ray again.

"Nothing."

"Sure, that's what they all say."

I rolled my eyes and decided to lie. "I killed somebody."

A few of them believed me. A few of them looked at me cautiously, like it might be possible that I actually had killed somebody. And one person looked at me like he knew it wasn't true. I just avoided looking at him. It was almost like he could see through me, like he knew that I hadn't actually done anything that would make me deserve to get sent here. And maybe, one day, I would tell everybody the truth, but right now, I can't. I can't trust anybody.


	4. 4:30 AM Wakeup Call

SORRY, people, but I don't think this is going to be a romance. Rory and the guys are just going to be FRIENDS. Sorry to disappoint, but I don't want this story to be one of those cliche girl goes to Camp Green Lake and falls in love stories.

**Chapter 3: 4:30 AM Wakeup Call**

What kind of psychotic people wake up at 4:30 in the morning? I normally wake up around 8 or 9. To me, 4:30 is still _night. _It it not morning. So when somebody shouted at me and told me it was already 4:30 and that it was time for breakfast, I was _sure _I had heard whoever it was wrong. Unfortunately, I hadn't. So I just grumbled a bunch and got out of my cot, pulled my hair back into a ponytail and walked out of the tent.

I followed the group of boys from my tent, who were headed towards a big group of orange jumpsuit-clad boys. Mr. Sir, Dr. Pendanski and a few other counselors were milling about, making sure everybody ended up in this big line. And even though I was exhausted, it didn't take me too long to realize that everyone was getting shovels out of this crude shed with _Library _painted across the top. I just grabbed a shovel and moved away, then leaned on it while yawning and rubbing the sleep from my eyes. Stanley/Caveman came up to me and grinned. "You get used to it after a while," he said, and I wondered which part of this new life at Camp Green Lake he meant. The 4:30 AM wakeup call, the horrible food, or digging holes, most of which were new experiences for me. I just nodded in reply to him. I was too tired to talk.

He was silent for a while, then he looked up at me and said, real quietly, "You lied."

"'Bout what?" I stalled, trying to get out of the conversation.

"You didn't kill anyone."

_How in the world does he know?_ I thought, a bit panicked that he could read me so well, because I've always considered myself a good liar.

I just shrugged, trying to act nonchalant about the whole thing.

"What did you do?"

_Just keep quiet, Rory, _I told myself, toeing the dirt with my boot.

"Alright, nobody can make you talk. Word of advice, though, make sure you call everybody by their nickname. They don't take it too well when Mom calls them by their real names."

I nodded again. At least there was one nice guy at camp. "Caveman" was okay. But the rest of D tent, with the exception of Zero and Caveman, well, they all seemed...creepy.

I heard Mr. Sir yell something, and pretty soon everybody was walking out to the desert. I just picked up my shovel and canteen and followed Caveman out. After walked past what must have been thousands of holes, we got to a spot that hadn't been dug up yet. Everybody moved away and started digging, and I saw Mr. Sir coming my way.

"Like I said before, just dig as deep as your shovel, and make sure it can go around perfectly in every direction. Water truck comes 'round in a while." he said, spitting some sunflower seeds on the ground. "Now, if you find somethin' you find interestin', you are to show it to Pendanski or me, got it?" I nodded, he spit. "This isn't a girl scout camp."

"That's a good thing, sir," I drawled. "I was never a girl scout." I heard someone snicker, and Mr. Sir looked peeved, but walked away without replying. I thought I heard him mutter something about girls and their antics. I rolled my eyes and stuck my shovel in the ground as far as it would go. It only sunk in a few inches. I looked over at the other boys and watched how they dug for a while. After a few minutes I was able to successfully start my hole, but it was hard. I'd never dug a hole in my life. Not a real one, anyway.

By the time I saw the water truck coming towards our group, my energy was about drained and my hole was dinky compared to everyone else's. I wiped the sweat from my forehead with the dusty sleeve of my jumpsuit, picked up my canteen and slowly made my way over to the line. My back was sore, my arms were aching, my neck felt horrible, I was sweating up a storm and I felt ready to collapse. My hands were bloody with blisters, so I gingerly held out my canteen to Mr. Sir when it was my turn.

He glanced at my hands and snorted. "Don't worry about no blisters, girl. You've never done manual labor, but you'll get used to it. No prissy hands at Camp Green Lake."

I just nodded and took my water, then dragged myself back to my hole. I sat down, breathing pretty heavily. I looked at my hands and winced, but I knew I wouldn't have blisters forever. I was thinking that there was no WAY this place was legal- that there had to be quite a few laws against making kids dig holes, child labor laws or something, when Caveman came over and plopped down next to me.

I glanced over at him, then down at the dirt. "Mine were worse," he said after a while. I looked at him with one eyebrow raised in confusion. "Blisters," he elaborated with a grin.

I held up my bloody palms and shook my head. "No way. It can't get any worse than this."

"Just don't pour water on them. If you do, the dust starts clinging and it'll sting even worse."

He stood up and motioned to my shovel. "Better start digging. Hottest part of the day is coming up."

I scowled at him as he walked away, then pushed myself to my feet and picked up my shovel. My arms screamed in pain. I bit my lip and got to work.

By the time Dr Pendanski brought lunch around, my hands were a lot bloodier, but my hole was quite a bit deeper too. I didn't even notice what we ate, I just gulped it down and went back to my hole.

After a while the boys started to go back to the camp, one by one. Pretty soon I was the only one left, but I knew that I'd be there a while. My hole was almost perfect, but it still slanted some.

I was completely exhausted by the time I finished. I could barely will my legs to carry me back to camp. The muscles in my arms were tighter than bow strings. I grabbed my clean set of clothes and went off to the showers. As I climbed inside my curtained stall, I reflected on my first day at Camp Green Lake. The bad food. The smelly sheets. The psychotic early wakeup call. The digging. Especially the digging. I glanced down at my hands again. As the water washed away the blood and dirt, they didn't look so bad, but they hurt like the dickens. And man, what psychos were employed here? Mr _SIR? _What kind of name is that? And that really strange stalker-type Docter person. He seemed like he was high all the time, because nobody is cheerful every minute of theirs lives, and I've seen what drugs can do to people.

By the time I got back to the tent I was so tired I just dropped onto my cot. I was really hungry, too, but sleep must have won over in the end, because all too soon it was morning and I could hear the boys talking to each other and walking around.


	5. Was That A Rattlesnake?

A/N: I know it's been a while since I've updated. Just lacked inspiration, I guess.

Disclaimer: I do not own Holes.

**Chapter 4: Was That A Rattlesnake?**

"Rory! Rory! You up yet?"

I groaned and rolled over, then quickly regretted the decision. Every muscle in my body screamed out in protest. I could never remember being so sore. I lay there for a minute, hoping I was dreaming. But then I turned my head into my pillow, and the sour milk smell reminded me-this was no dream. This was a _nightmare, _only I couldn't wake up from it.

Another minute passed by, and whoever it was kept screaming my name, so I finally croaked out, "I'm up, I'm up!" My throat felt like I hadn't had a drop of water in days. I sat up really slowly, praying that the pain would lessen or go away. It didn't.

I dressed really slowly, and by the time I left the tent, almost everybody had already gotten their shovels.

Mr. Sir laughed when he saw me. "Sore, are ya, girly?" I just scowled and glared at him, then turned away real quickly to cover my yawn.

He just chuckled again. "You'll get used to it."

That's what everyone had been telling me. I yawned again and willed my eyes to stay open.

On the way out to dig, most of the boys were joking around while I just trudged silently behind them, barely keeping a grip on my shovel because I was so tired and sore.

When we were about halfway out, Caveman fell into step beside me.

"Here," he said, holding out a pair of worn gloves. "I found an extra pair."

I took them and gave him a small half-smile. "Thanks."

"The second hole is the hardest." He said with a grin.

I snickered. "That's what everyone said about the first hole."

"They lied."

"Oh, and what about the third hole?"

"That one's the hardest too."

"Does it ever get easy?"

"Oh, sure it does. When you hit your tenth hole, you're kinda getting used to it. Twentieth hole, you're a whole lot better and it barely hurts at all."

"Oh, goody. Only nineteen holes to go until I don't feel pain."

Caveman smiled, then walked away, as we had already reached the designated digging spot.

I dropped my canteen, put my cap on my head, shoved my hands into the gloves, and started digging.

And Caveman was right. The second hole is the hardest. I didn't know what the third hole would be like, but I was so sore I could barely get the shovel in the dirt. My back, arms, legs, hands, everything hurt.

By the time the water truck came around, my hole was smaller then it had been the day before. I groaned, dropped my shovel, scooped up my canteen, and took my place at the end of the line.

I went back to my hole with my full canteen and dropped to a sitting position. I sat there for a few minutes, trying to determine how much energy I had left. Not that it mattered much anyway. At Camp Green Lake, you finished digging your hole even if it took all night, that was something I could just instinctively tell. And considering the size of my hole, it seemed like I was going to be there till it was dark.

So I dug. I didn't think, I didn't talk, I just dug. I was taking a little break when I looked over at Caveman and noticed he wasn't wearing gloves. Then I remembered that he had been wearing gloves the day before, and he had given me a pair that morning.

I rolled my eyes, climbed out of my hole, and walked over there. I didn't like it when people took pity on me. And giving me the gloves that they usually wore was something I construed as pity.

I sat down, took off the gloves, and tossed them at him. He picked them up, looked at them for a second, and tossed them back.

"Keep them."

I tossed them back at him. "I don't need any pity."

"It's not pity, I'm just trying to help." The gloves landed in my lap. I threw them in his hole.

"The gloves are yours. Keep them. I'll be fine."

"You're really stubborn, do you know that?"

I nodded.

"Look at your hands. They're bloody. Keep the gloves."

He threw them again and they landed by my feet. I picked them up and threw them back at him. One landed on his shoulder and the other fell into his hole.

"They make my hands hurt anyway."

"But they hurt a lot less than if you were just holding the shovel."

"I don't want them. I'm guessing nobody gave you their gloves when you first came. I'll tough it out."

I got up and walked away, and I could just picture Caveman shaking his head.

I didn't want anybody to make this experience any easier. I'd been through a lot, and surely I could dig holes without gloves.

Once I picked up the shovel, I knew Caveman was right. I should've kept the gloves. My hands hurt worse than ever before. But I kept digging.

My hole was just past the halfway point when I heard something. I stopped digging and listened for a few minutes, and then, there it was again.

I looked around me for a moment before I spotted it-a snake, curled up, making a strange little noise.

Now, I've seen snakes. I just can't tell one snake from another, so when I see a snake, my first instinct is to run. They freak me out, completely. After a minute of me watching it, it slithered away. I watched it until I couldn't see it anymore. Zigzag was up and walking around, because he had finished his hole, I guess, and he must've seen it, because he came over.

"Was that a rattlesnake?" I asked, because I honestly didn't know.

He laughed. That's all-just laughed. And I was ready to smack him with my shovel when he stopped. "City girls. Gotta love 'em."

Then he left, dragging his shovel and muttering to himself.

Pretty soon everyone was leaving. I was only about three-fourths of the way done. Not even that, I realized, because it was deeper in the center and slanted out at the edges. I thought I remembered that happening the day before too, and wondered if that would happen every hole I dug.

I heard something land on the dirt, and when I looked, lo and behold, there were the gloves, and there was Caveman, walking away.


End file.
